Page:An Encyclopædia of Cottage, Farm, and Villa Architecture and Furniture.djvu/745

 KITCHENS OF COUNTRY INNS. 7-n verse section on the line C D ; and flg. 1366 is a front elevation, bhowing the door to the oven, k, and the opening to the tunnel below, /. Ovens of this description are in general 1365 13o7 J I I 1 I I I use in France ; but m those of Paris, where dry wood is always used, the funnels, d and e. are seldom made use of, but to cool the oven, or to admit of the escape of the vapour from the bread. It may be observed, also, that, in some of the ovens of Paris, the fuel, instead of being burned on the general surface of the hearth, is consumed in iron gratings or baskets, placed over the openings, c c ; which is found a more rapid and economical mode of heating, than that of making a fire on the floor of the oven. 1507. Oven for Coal. Ovens like that just described, but most frequently without the funnel, e i, in fig. 1368, were almost the only kind used in Britain, till about fifty years ago, wlien an improvement was made in them, in order to admit of heating them with coal, by Powell, an oven-builder in Lisle Street, London. A subsequent improve- ment has since been made by Waugh, of Howland Mews, Tottenham Court Road, which consists in the introduction of a register or damper for the oven flue. That this damper should not have been introduced sooner is a proof that very few have looked at the oven with a scientific eye. We have examined a great number in London, and found most of them of a very rude construction ; but, rude as this construction is, we have found no one acquainted with it, but a particular description of biicklayers, whose exclusive business is that of building ovens. The process of heating an oven by coal is rather interesting to those who have never seen an oven heated otherwise than by wood. After lighting the fire, the roof of the oven in a short time is perfectly black with soot ; some time afterwards, in consequence of the intensity of the fire, the soot begins to ignite, and eventually becomes red ; in this state it remains only a few minutes for the intensity of the fire being continued, it turns white, and drops, like a shower of volcanic ashes, on the floor of the oven. The oven is now considered to be sufficiently heated ; the furnace door is thrown open, and the floor of the oven wiped out, so as to be ready to receive the bread. We shall shortly describe the best sort of baker's oven now in use in London for baking bread and roasting meat ; suggesting certain additions to it, calculated for performing the latter operation in a higher degree of perfection. Fig. 1 369 is a groimd plan of an oven, rather under the middle size ; in which a is the furnace, for heating it by coal or wood, as may be most convenient ; 6 is the doer of A N